This book is an enquiry into the relationship between the ways things are and the way we think and talk about them. It is also a study of Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations: the author ...
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This book is an enquiry into the relationship between the ways things are and the way we think and talk about them. It is also a study of Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations: the author develops his account of certain key themes into a unified view of the work as a whole. His methodological starting-point is to see Wittgenstein's work as a response to Frege's. The central question is: how does thought get its footing? How can the thought that things are a certain way be connected to things being that way? The second key theme is this: a representation of things as being a certain way cannot take the right form for truth-bearing without a background of agreement in judgements: its form must belong to thinkers of a given kind. The third key theme is that the proprietary perceptions of a given sort of thinker, as to what would be a case of judging when there is a particular way for things to be, is not subject to criticism from outside it. The author's distinctive take on such topics as the problem of singular thought, the notion of a proposition, rule-following, sense and nonsense, the possibility of private language, and the representational content of experience is presented.Less

Charles Travis

Published in print: 2006-08-03

This book is an enquiry into the relationship between the ways things are and the way we think and talk about them. It is also a study of Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations: the author develops his account of certain key themes into a unified view of the work as a whole. His methodological starting-point is to see Wittgenstein's work as a response to Frege's. The central question is: how does thought get its footing? How can the thought that things are a certain way be connected to things being that way? The second key theme is this: a representation of things as being a certain way cannot take the right form for truth-bearing without a background of agreement in judgements: its form must belong to thinkers of a given kind. The third key theme is that the proprietary perceptions of a given sort of thinker, as to what would be a case of judging when there is a particular way for things to be, is not subject to criticism from outside it. The author's distinctive take on such topics as the problem of singular thought, the notion of a proposition, rule-following, sense and nonsense, the possibility of private language, and the representational content of experience is presented.

Belief in propositions has had a long and distinguished history in analytic philosophy. Three of the founding fathers of analytic philosophy, Gottlob Frege, Bertrand Russell, and G. E. Moore, ...
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Belief in propositions has had a long and distinguished history in analytic philosophy. Three of the founding fathers of analytic philosophy, Gottlob Frege, Bertrand Russell, and G. E. Moore, believed in propositions. Many philosophers since then have shared this belief; and the belief is widely, though certainly not universally, accepted among philosophers today. Among contemporary philosophers who believe in propositions, many, and perhaps even most, take them to be structured entities with individuals, properties, and relations as constituents. For example, the proposition that ‘Glenn loves Tracy’ has Glenn, the loving relation, and Tracy as constituents. What is it, then, that binds these constituents together and imposes structure on them? And if the proposition that ‘Glenn loves Tracy’ is distinct from the proposition that ‘Tracy loves Glenn’ yet both have the same constituents, what is it about the way these constituents are structured or bound together that makes them two different propositions? This book formulates an account of the metaphysical nature of propositions, and provides fresh answers to the above questions. In addition to explaining what it is that binds together the constituents of structured propositions and imposes structure on them, the book deals with some of the standard objections to accounts of propositions: it shows that there is no mystery about what propositions are; that given certain minimal assumptions, it follows that they exist; and that on this approach, we can see how and why propositions manage to have truth conditions and represent the world as being a certain way. The book also contains a detailed account of the nature of tense and modality, and provides a solution to the paradox of analysis.Less

The Nature and Structure of Content

Jeffrey C. King

Published in print: 2007-04-26

Belief in propositions has had a long and distinguished history in analytic philosophy. Three of the founding fathers of analytic philosophy, Gottlob Frege, Bertrand Russell, and G. E. Moore, believed in propositions. Many philosophers since then have shared this belief; and the belief is widely, though certainly not universally, accepted among philosophers today. Among contemporary philosophers who believe in propositions, many, and perhaps even most, take them to be structured entities with individuals, properties, and relations as constituents. For example, the proposition that ‘Glenn loves Tracy’ has Glenn, the loving relation, and Tracy as constituents. What is it, then, that binds these constituents together and imposes structure on them? And if the proposition that ‘Glenn loves Tracy’ is distinct from the proposition that ‘Tracy loves Glenn’ yet both have the same constituents, what is it about the way these constituents are structured or bound together that makes them two different propositions? This book formulates an account of the metaphysical nature of propositions, and provides fresh answers to the above questions. In addition to explaining what it is that binds together the constituents of structured propositions and imposes structure on them, the book deals with some of the standard objections to accounts of propositions: it shows that there is no mystery about what propositions are; that given certain minimal assumptions, it follows that they exist; and that on this approach, we can see how and why propositions manage to have truth conditions and represent the world as being a certain way. The book also contains a detailed account of the nature of tense and modality, and provides a solution to the paradox of analysis.

This book is a critical examination of the astonishing progress made in the philosophical study of the properties of the natural numbers from the 1880s to the 1930s. It reassesses the brilliant ...
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This book is a critical examination of the astonishing progress made in the philosophical study of the properties of the natural numbers from the 1880s to the 1930s. It reassesses the brilliant innovations of Frege, Russell, Wittgenstein, and others, which transformed philosophy as well as the understanding of mathematics. The book argues that through the problem of arithmetic participates in the larger puzzle of the relationship between thought, language, experience, and the world, we can distinguish accounts that look to each of these to supply the content we require: those that involve the structure of our experience of the world; those that explicitly involve our grasp of a ‘third realm’ of abstract objects distinct from the concrete objects of the empirical world and the ideas of the author's private Gedankenwelt; those that appeal to something non-physical that is nevertheless an aspect of reality in harmony with which the physical aspect of the world is configured; and finally those that involve only our grasp of language.Less

Reason's Nearest Kin : Philosophies of Arithmetic from Kant to Carnap

Michael Potter

Published in print: 2002-06-13

This book is a critical examination of the astonishing progress made in the philosophical study of the properties of the natural numbers from the 1880s to the 1930s. It reassesses the brilliant innovations of Frege, Russell, Wittgenstein, and others, which transformed philosophy as well as the understanding of mathematics. The book argues that through the problem of arithmetic participates in the larger puzzle of the relationship between thought, language, experience, and the world, we can distinguish accounts that look to each of these to supply the content we require: those that involve the structure of our experience of the world; those that explicitly involve our grasp of a ‘third realm’ of abstract objects distinct from the concrete objects of the empirical world and the ideas of the author's private Gedankenwelt; those that appeal to something non-physical that is nevertheless an aspect of reality in harmony with which the physical aspect of the world is configured; and finally those that involve only our grasp of language.

Wittgenstein's philosophical career began in 1911 when he went to Cambridge to work with Russell. He compiled the Notes on Logic two years later as a kind of summary of the work he had done so far. ...
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Wittgenstein's philosophical career began in 1911 when he went to Cambridge to work with Russell. He compiled the Notes on Logic two years later as a kind of summary of the work he had done so far. Russell thought that they were ‘as good as anything that has ever been done in logic’, but he had Wittgenstein himself to explain them to him. Without the benefit of Wittgenstein's explanations, most later scholars have preferred to treat the Notes solely as an interpretative aid in understanding the Tractatus (which draws on them for material), rather than as a philosophical work in their own right. This book demonstrates the philosophical and historical importance of the Notes. By teasing out the meaning of key passages, it shows how many of the most important insights in the Tractatus they contain. It discusses in detail how Wittgenstein arrived at these insights by thinking through ideas he obtained from Russell and Frege. And it uses a blend of biography and philosophy to illuminate the methods Wittgenstein used in his work. The book features the complete text of the Notes in a critical edition, with a detailed discussion of the circumstances in which they were compiled.Less

Wittgenstein's Notes on Logic

Michael Potter

Published in print: 2008-10-01

Wittgenstein's philosophical career began in 1911 when he went to Cambridge to work with Russell. He compiled the Notes on Logic two years later as a kind of summary of the work he had done so far. Russell thought that they were ‘as good as anything that has ever been done in logic’, but he had Wittgenstein himself to explain them to him. Without the benefit of Wittgenstein's explanations, most later scholars have preferred to treat the Notes solely as an interpretative aid in understanding the Tractatus (which draws on them for material), rather than as a philosophical work in their own right. This book demonstrates the philosophical and historical importance of the Notes. By teasing out the meaning of key passages, it shows how many of the most important insights in the Tractatus they contain. It discusses in detail how Wittgenstein arrived at these insights by thinking through ideas he obtained from Russell and Frege. And it uses a blend of biography and philosophy to illuminate the methods Wittgenstein used in his work. The book features the complete text of the Notes in a critical edition, with a detailed discussion of the circumstances in which they were compiled.

Expressivism — the sophisticated contemporary incarnation of the noncognitivist research program of Ayer, Stevenson, and Hare — is no longer the province of metaethicists alone. Its comprehensive ...
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Expressivism — the sophisticated contemporary incarnation of the noncognitivist research program of Ayer, Stevenson, and Hare — is no longer the province of metaethicists alone. Its comprehensive view about the nature of both normative language and normative thought has also recently been applied to many topics elsewhere in philosophy. Yet the semantic commitments of expressivism are still poorly understood and have not been very far developed. Expressivists have not yet even managed to solve the ‘negation problem’ — to explain why atomic normative sentences are inconsistent with their negations. As a result, it is far from clear that expressivism even could be true. This book evaluates the semantic commitments of expressivism by showing how an expressivist semantics would work, what it can do, and what kind of assumptions would be required, in order for it to do it. Building on a highly general understanding of the basic ideas of expressivism, it argues that expressivists can solve the negation problem — but only in one kind of way. It shows how this insight paves the way for an explanatorily powerful, constructive expressivist semantics, which solves many of what have been taken to be the deepest problems for expressivism, including making unprecedented progress in attacking the well-known Frege-Geach problem for noncognitivist theories. But it also argues that any account which can attain these advantages will face further, even more formidable, obstacles. Expressivism, it is argued, is coherent and interesting, but false.Less

Being For : Evaluating the Semantic Program of Expressivism

Mark Schroeder

Published in print: 2008-06-05

Expressivism — the sophisticated contemporary incarnation of the noncognitivist research program of Ayer, Stevenson, and Hare — is no longer the province of metaethicists alone. Its comprehensive view about the nature of both normative language and normative thought has also recently been applied to many topics elsewhere in philosophy. Yet the semantic commitments of expressivism are still poorly understood and have not been very far developed. Expressivists have not yet even managed to solve the ‘negation problem’ — to explain why atomic normative sentences are inconsistent with their negations. As a result, it is far from clear that expressivism even could be true. This book evaluates the semantic commitments of expressivism by showing how an expressivist semantics would work, what it can do, and what kind of assumptions would be required, in order for it to do it. Building on a highly general understanding of the basic ideas of expressivism, it argues that expressivists can solve the negation problem — but only in one kind of way. It shows how this insight paves the way for an explanatorily powerful, constructive expressivist semantics, which solves many of what have been taken to be the deepest problems for expressivism, including making unprecedented progress in attacking the well-known Frege-Geach problem for noncognitivist theories. But it also argues that any account which can attain these advantages will face further, even more formidable, obstacles. Expressivism, it is argued, is coherent and interesting, but false.

The work of Bertrand Russell had a decisive influence on the emergence of analytic philosophy, and on its subsequent development. The essays collected in this volume, by one of the authorities on ...
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The work of Bertrand Russell had a decisive influence on the emergence of analytic philosophy, and on its subsequent development. The essays collected in this volume, by one of the authorities on Russell's philosophy, all aim at recapturing and articulating aspects of Russell's philosophical vision during his most influential and important period, the two decades following his break with Idealism in 1899. One theme of the collection concerns Russell's views about propositions and their analysis, and the relation of those ideas to his rejection of Idealism. Another theme is the development of Russell's logicism, culminating in Whitehead's and Russell's Principia Mathematica, and the author offers a revealing view of the conception of logic that underlies it. Here again there is an emphasis on Russell's argument against Idealism, on the idea that his logicism was a crucial part of that argument. A further focus of the volume is Russell's views about functions and propositional functions. This theme is part of a contrast that the author draws between Russell's general philosophical position and that of Frege; in particular, there is a close parallel with the quite different views that the two philosophers held about the nature of philosophical analysis. The author also sheds light on the much-disputed idea of an operation, which Wittgenstein advances in the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus.Less

Peter Hylton

Published in print: 2005-09-22

The work of Bertrand Russell had a decisive influence on the emergence of analytic philosophy, and on its subsequent development. The essays collected in this volume, by one of the authorities on Russell's philosophy, all aim at recapturing and articulating aspects of Russell's philosophical vision during his most influential and important period, the two decades following his break with Idealism in 1899. One theme of the collection concerns Russell's views about propositions and their analysis, and the relation of those ideas to his rejection of Idealism. Another theme is the development of Russell's logicism, culminating in Whitehead's and Russell's Principia Mathematica, and the author offers a revealing view of the conception of logic that underlies it. Here again there is an emphasis on Russell's argument against Idealism, on the idea that his logicism was a crucial part of that argument. A further focus of the volume is Russell's views about functions and propositional functions. This theme is part of a contrast that the author draws between Russell's general philosophical position and that of Frege; in particular, there is a close parallel with the quite different views that the two philosophers held about the nature of philosophical analysis. The author also sheds light on the much-disputed idea of an operation, which Wittgenstein advances in the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus.

Thought, to be thought at all, must be about a world independent of us. But thinking takes capacities for thought, which inevitably shape thought's objects. What would count as something being ...
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Thought, to be thought at all, must be about a world independent of us. But thinking takes capacities for thought, which inevitably shape thought's objects. What would count as something being green—so when it would be true that it was—is identified, somehow, by what those who have being green in mind, are prepared to recognize. Which can make it seem that what is true, and what not, is not independent of us. In which case our thought is not really about an independent world—so not really thought at all. Two apparent truisms thus form an apparent paradox. Much philosophy, from Locke to Quine, from Kant to Frege to Wittgenstein, to Putnam, to John McDowell, is a response to this, often dominated by it. This book contains eleven chapters, each working in its own way towards dissolving this air of paradox, and towards giving the role of the parochial in our thought—features of our thought which need not belong to all thought—its proper, unthreatening, due.Less

Objectivity and the Parochial

Charles Travis

Published in print: 2010-10-14

Thought, to be thought at all, must be about a world independent of us. But thinking takes capacities for thought, which inevitably shape thought's objects. What would count as something being green—so when it would be true that it was—is identified, somehow, by what those who have being green in mind, are prepared to recognize. Which can make it seem that what is true, and what not, is not independent of us. In which case our thought is not really about an independent world—so not really thought at all. Two apparent truisms thus form an apparent paradox. Much philosophy, from Locke to Quine, from Kant to Frege to Wittgenstein, to Putnam, to John McDowell, is a response to this, often dominated by it. This book contains eleven chapters, each working in its own way towards dissolving this air of paradox, and towards giving the role of the parochial in our thought—features of our thought which need not belong to all thought—its proper, unthreatening, due.

Frege’s Coneption of Logic explores the relationship between Frege’s understanding of conceptual analysis and his understanding of logic. It is argued that the fruitfulness of Frege’s ...
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Frege’s Coneption of Logic explores the relationship between Frege’s understanding of conceptual analysis and his understanding of logic. It is argued that the fruitfulness of Frege’s conception of logic, and the illuminating differences between that conception and those more modern views that have largely supplanted it, are best understood against the backdrop of a clear account of the role of conceptual analysis in logical investigation. The first part of the book locates the role of conceptual analysis in Frege’s logicist project. It is argued that, despite a number of difficulties, Frege’s use of analysis in the service of logicism is a powerful and coherent tool. As a result of coming to grips with his use of that tool, we can see that there is, despite appearances, no conflict between Frege’s intention to demonstrate the grounds of ordinary arithmetic and the fact that the numerals of his derived sentences fail to co-refer with ordinary numerals. The second part of the book explores the resulting conception of logic itself, and some of the straightforward ways in which Frege’s conception differs from its now-familiar descendants. In particular, it’s argued that consistency, as Frege understands it, differs significantly from the kind of consistency demonstrable via the construction of models. To appreciate this difference is to appreciate the extent to which Frege was right in his debate with Hilbert over consistency- and independence-proofs in geometry. For similar reasons, modern results such as the completeness of formal systems and the categoricity of theories do not have for Frege the same importance they are commonly taken to have by his post-Tarskian descendants. These differences, together with the coherence of Frege’s position, provide reason for caution with respect to the appeal to formal systems and their properties in the treatment of fundamental logical properties and relations.Less

Frege’s Conception of Logic

Patricia A. Blanchette

Published in print: 2012-04-20

Frege’s Coneption of Logic explores the relationship between Frege’s understanding of conceptual analysis and his understanding of logic. It is argued that the fruitfulness of Frege’s conception of logic, and the illuminating differences between that conception and those more modern views that have largely supplanted it, are best understood against the backdrop of a clear account of the role of conceptual analysis in logical investigation. The first part of the book locates the role of conceptual analysis in Frege’s logicist project. It is argued that, despite a number of difficulties, Frege’s use of analysis in the service of logicism is a powerful and coherent tool. As a result of coming to grips with his use of that tool, we can see that there is, despite appearances, no conflict between Frege’s intention to demonstrate the grounds of ordinary arithmetic and the fact that the numerals of his derived sentences fail to co-refer with ordinary numerals. The second part of the book explores the resulting conception of logic itself, and some of the straightforward ways in which Frege’s conception differs from its now-familiar descendants. In particular, it’s argued that consistency, as Frege understands it, differs significantly from the kind of consistency demonstrable via the construction of models. To appreciate this difference is to appreciate the extent to which Frege was right in his debate with Hilbert over consistency- and independence-proofs in geometry. For similar reasons, modern results such as the completeness of formal systems and the categoricity of theories do not have for Frege the same importance they are commonly taken to have by his post-Tarskian descendants. These differences, together with the coherence of Frege’s position, provide reason for caution with respect to the appeal to formal systems and their properties in the treatment of fundamental logical properties and relations.

This book concerns the nature of reference, and the theory it develops is intermediate between direct reference theories and descriptivist theories. A guiding thought is that just as truth conditions ...
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This book concerns the nature of reference, and the theory it develops is intermediate between direct reference theories and descriptivist theories. A guiding thought is that just as truth conditions (rather than truth values) can throw light on the meaning of sentences so can reference conditions (rather than referents) throw light on the meaning of referring expressions. A reference condition need not be a descriptive condition, and it need not be satisfied. The first of these points marks the divergence from descriptivist theories, and the second, from direct reference theories. This idea is applied to proper names, pronouns, and definite descriptions (singular, plural and mass); problems of existential and fictional sentences are addressed; and, in the final chapter, an analogue of the main idea is applied to mental content.Less

Reference without Referents

R. M. Sainsbury

Published in print: 2005-05-05

This book concerns the nature of reference, and the theory it develops is intermediate between direct reference theories and descriptivist theories. A guiding thought is that just as truth conditions (rather than truth values) can throw light on the meaning of sentences so can reference conditions (rather than referents) throw light on the meaning of referring expressions. A reference condition need not be a descriptive condition, and it need not be satisfied. The first of these points marks the divergence from descriptivist theories, and the second, from direct reference theories. This idea is applied to proper names, pronouns, and definite descriptions (singular, plural and mass); problems of existential and fictional sentences are addressed; and, in the final chapter, an analogue of the main idea is applied to mental content.

This chapter lays out the central theme of the book, the interaction between Frege’s understanding of conceptual analysis and his understanding of logic. It also sketches the contents of the ...
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This chapter lays out the central theme of the book, the interaction between Frege’s understanding of conceptual analysis and his understanding of logic. It also sketches the contents of the succeeding chapters.Less

Introduction

Patricia A. Blanchette

Published in print: 2012-04-20

This chapter lays out the central theme of the book, the interaction between Frege’s understanding of conceptual analysis and his understanding of logic. It also sketches the contents of the succeeding chapters.

This book explores the difficulties presented for Gottlob Frege's semantic theory, as well as its modern descendents, by the treatment of defined expressions. The book begins by focusing on the ...
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This book explores the difficulties presented for Gottlob Frege's semantic theory, as well as its modern descendents, by the treatment of defined expressions. The book begins by focusing on the psychological constraints governing Frege's notion of sense, or meaning, and argues that, given these constraints, even the treatment of simple stipulative definitions led Frege to important difficulties. This book suggests ways out of these difficulties that are both philosophically and logically plausible and Fregean in spirit. This discussion is then connected to a number of more familiar topics, such as indexicality and the discussion of concepts in recent theories of mind and language. The latter part of the book, after introducing a simple semantic model of senses as procedures, considers the problems that definitions present for Frege's idea that the sense of an expression should mirror its grammatical structure. The requirement can be satisfied, the book argues, only if defined expressions—and incomplete expressions as well—are assigned senses of their own, rather than treated contextually. The book then explores one way in which these senses might be reified within the procedural model, drawing on ideas from work in the semantics of computer programming languages. With its combination of technical semantics and history of philosophy, the book tackles some of the hardest questions in the philosophy of language.Less

Frege on Definitions : A Case Study of Semantic Content

John Horty

Published in print: 2009-11-20

This book explores the difficulties presented for Gottlob Frege's semantic theory, as well as its modern descendents, by the treatment of defined expressions. The book begins by focusing on the psychological constraints governing Frege's notion of sense, or meaning, and argues that, given these constraints, even the treatment of simple stipulative definitions led Frege to important difficulties. This book suggests ways out of these difficulties that are both philosophically and logically plausible and Fregean in spirit. This discussion is then connected to a number of more familiar topics, such as indexicality and the discussion of concepts in recent theories of mind and language. The latter part of the book, after introducing a simple semantic model of senses as procedures, considers the problems that definitions present for Frege's idea that the sense of an expression should mirror its grammatical structure. The requirement can be satisfied, the book argues, only if defined expressions—and incomplete expressions as well—are assigned senses of their own, rather than treated contextually. The book then explores one way in which these senses might be reified within the procedural model, drawing on ideas from work in the semantics of computer programming languages. With its combination of technical semantics and history of philosophy, the book tackles some of the hardest questions in the philosophy of language.

This book presents the development of an anti-Fregean conception on the philosophy of language. It argues that Wittgenstein not only anticipated the important features of the anti-Fregean approach, ...
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This book presents the development of an anti-Fregean conception on the philosophy of language. It argues that Wittgenstein not only anticipated the important features of the anti-Fregean approach, but provided a deeper and more satisfying rationale than recent works. Where Wittgenstein sharply diverged from the anti-Fregeans, he pointed the way forward.Less

The Magic Prism : An Essay in the Philosophy of Language

Howard Wettstein

Published in print: 2004-04-22

This book presents the development of an anti-Fregean conception on the philosophy of language. It argues that Wittgenstein not only anticipated the important features of the anti-Fregean approach, but provided a deeper and more satisfying rationale than recent works. Where Wittgenstein sharply diverged from the anti-Fregeans, he pointed the way forward.

Colin McGinn

Published in print:

2000

Published Online:

November 2003

ISBN:

9780199241811

eISBN:

9780191598029

Item type:

book

Publisher:

Oxford University Press

DOI:

10.1093/0199241813.001.0001

Subject:

Philosophy, General

This book discusses the nature of identity, existence, predication, necessity, and truth. Its main claims are that identity, existence, and truth are logical properties, that predicates are singular ...
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This book discusses the nature of identity, existence, predication, necessity, and truth. Its main claims are that identity, existence, and truth are logical properties, that predicates are singular terms that refer to properties, and that necessity (and other modalities) are modes of instantiation of properties by objects. The book develops a realist anti‐naturalist stance on logical properties, which takes logical notions at face value, and refuses to reduce them to other notions. Two further contentions central to this work are, first, that the quantifier has been overrated as an instrument of logico‐linguistic analysis; and secondly, that past attempts to define logical notions such as identity or existence have been largely unsuccessful.Less

Colin McGinn

Published in print: 2000-11-09

This book discusses the nature of identity, existence, predication, necessity, and truth. Its main claims are that identity, existence, and truth are logical properties, that predicates are singular terms that refer to properties, and that necessity (and other modalities) are modes of instantiation of properties by objects. The book develops a realist anti‐naturalist stance on logical properties, which takes logical notions at face value, and refuses to reduce them to other notions. Two further contentions central to this work are, first, that the quantifier has been overrated as an instrument of logico‐linguistic analysis; and secondly, that past attempts to define logical notions such as identity or existence have been largely unsuccessful.

This book is an original examination of attempts to dislodge a cornerstone of modern philosophy: the idea that our thoughts and utterances are representations of slices of reality. Representations ...
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This book is an original examination of attempts to dislodge a cornerstone of modern philosophy: the idea that our thoughts and utterances are representations of slices of reality. Representations that are accurate are usually said to be true, to correspond to the facts—this is the foundation of correspondence theories of truth. A number of prominent philosophers have tried to undermine the idea that propositions, facts, and correspondence can play any useful role in philosophy, and formal arguments have been advanced to demonstrate that, under seemingly uncontroversial conditions, such entities collapse into an undifferentiated unity. The demise of individual facts is meant to herald the dawn of a new era in philosophy, in which debates about scepticism, realism, subjectivity, representational and computational theories of mind, possible worlds, and divergent conceptual schemes that represent reality in different ways to different persons, periods, or cultures evaporate through lack of subject matter. By carefully untangling a host of intersecting metaphysical, epistemological, semantic, and logical issues, and providing original analyses of key aspects of the work of Donald Davidson, Gottlob Frege, Bertrand Russell, and Kurt Gödel (to each of whom a chapter is dedicated), Stephen Neale demonstrates that arguments for the collapse of facts are considerably more complex and interesting than ever imagined. A number of deep semantic facts emerge along with a powerful proof: while it is technically possible to avoid the collapse of facts, rescue the idea of representations of reality, and thereby face anew the problems raised by the sceptic or the relativist, doing so requires making some tough semantic decisions about predicates and descriptions. It is simply impossible, Neale shows, to invoke representations, facts, states, or propositions without making hard choices—choices that may send many philosophers scurrying back to the drawing board. The book will be crucial to future work in metaphysics, the philosophy of language and mind, and logic, and will have profound implications far beyond.Less

Facing Facts

Stephen Neale

Published in print: 2001-11-01

This book is an original examination of attempts to dislodge a cornerstone of modern philosophy: the idea that our thoughts and utterances are representations of slices of reality. Representations that are accurate are usually said to be true, to correspond to the facts—this is the foundation of correspondence theories of truth. A number of prominent philosophers have tried to undermine the idea that propositions, facts, and correspondence can play any useful role in philosophy, and formal arguments have been advanced to demonstrate that, under seemingly uncontroversial conditions, such entities collapse into an undifferentiated unity. The demise of individual facts is meant to herald the dawn of a new era in philosophy, in which debates about scepticism, realism, subjectivity, representational and computational theories of mind, possible worlds, and divergent conceptual schemes that represent reality in different ways to different persons, periods, or cultures evaporate through lack of subject matter. By carefully untangling a host of intersecting metaphysical, epistemological, semantic, and logical issues, and providing original analyses of key aspects of the work of Donald Davidson, Gottlob Frege, Bertrand Russell, and Kurt Gödel (to each of whom a chapter is dedicated), Stephen Neale demonstrates that arguments for the collapse of facts are considerably more complex and interesting than ever imagined. A number of deep semantic facts emerge along with a powerful proof: while it is technically possible to avoid the collapse of facts, rescue the idea of representations of reality, and thereby face anew the problems raised by the sceptic or the relativist, doing so requires making some tough semantic decisions about predicates and descriptions. It is simply impossible, Neale shows, to invoke representations, facts, states, or propositions without making hard choices—choices that may send many philosophers scurrying back to the drawing board. The book will be crucial to future work in metaphysics, the philosophy of language and mind, and logic, and will have profound implications far beyond.

The book contains articles in metaphysics and philosophy of language written between 1975 and 1992. Dummett defends the verificationist theory of meaning, according to which in order to know the ...
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The book contains articles in metaphysics and philosophy of language written between 1975 and 1992. Dummett defends the verificationist theory of meaning, according to which in order to know the meaning of a statement one must be in possession of a procedure to verify it. He also argues for the link between bivalence and the metaphysical doctrine of realism. Other topics discussed include refutation of instrumentalism, mathematical applicability, backward causation, and the analysis of the concept of existence.Less

The Seas of Language

Michael Dummett

Published in print: 1996-02-29

The book contains articles in metaphysics and philosophy of language written between 1975 and 1992. Dummett defends the verificationist theory of meaning, according to which in order to know the meaning of a statement one must be in possession of a procedure to verify it. He also argues for the link between bivalence and the metaphysical doctrine of realism. Other topics discussed include refutation of instrumentalism, mathematical applicability, backward causation, and the analysis of the concept of existence.

This is the first of David Pears's acclaimed two‐volume work on the development of Wittgenstein's philosophy, covering the pre‐1929 writings. Part I of the first volume consists in a brief but ...
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This is the first of David Pears's acclaimed two‐volume work on the development of Wittgenstein's philosophy, covering the pre‐1929 writings. Part I of the first volume consists in a brief but eloquent overview of Wittgenstein's philosophy as a whole; Part II critically examines the earlier system, delineating and evaluating the central ideas (logical atomism, picture theory of meaning, and solipsism) with intellectual rigour and clarity. Pears succeeds in both offering an original realist interpretation of Wittgenstein's earlier thought, one that has found many followers, and in demarcating a structural framework that makes the internal organization of Wittgenstein's philosophy as a whole more accessible.Less

The False Prison Volume One

David Pears

Published in print: 1987-09-03

This is the first of David Pears's acclaimed two‐volume work on the development of Wittgenstein's philosophy, covering the pre‐1929 writings. Part I of the first volume consists in a brief but eloquent overview of Wittgenstein's philosophy as a whole; Part II critically examines the earlier system, delineating and evaluating the central ideas (logical atomism, picture theory of meaning, and solipsism) with intellectual rigour and clarity. Pears succeeds in both offering an original realist interpretation of Wittgenstein's earlier thought, one that has found many followers, and in demarcating a structural framework that makes the internal organization of Wittgenstein's philosophy as a whole more accessible.

Traditional formal logic as developed by Fred Sommers is compared and contrasted with the modern quantified predicate logic that we owe to Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell; the latter is argued to ...
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Traditional formal logic as developed by Fred Sommers is compared and contrasted with the modern quantified predicate logic that we owe to Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell; the latter is argued to be implicitly committed to a two-category ontology of particulars and universals. A system of sortal logic is described, which exhibits some features of traditional formal logic and some of modern quantified predicate logic, such as its deployment of a symbol for identity. It is argued that this system represents more perspicuously than other systems the ontological distinctions of the four-category ontology, and that this counts as a distinct advantage in its favour.Less

Formal Ontology and Logical Syntax

E. J. Lowe

Published in print: 2005-12-01

Traditional formal logic as developed by Fred Sommers is compared and contrasted with the modern quantified predicate logic that we owe to Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell; the latter is argued to be implicitly committed to a two-category ontology of particulars and universals. A system of sortal logic is described, which exhibits some features of traditional formal logic and some of modern quantified predicate logic, such as its deployment of a symbol for identity. It is argued that this system represents more perspicuously than other systems the ontological distinctions of the four-category ontology, and that this counts as a distinct advantage in its favour.

The formal ontological concept of an object is explicated and contrasted with that of a property. F. P. Ramsey’s objections to this distinction are challenged. The sense in which objects possess an ...
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The formal ontological concept of an object is explicated and contrasted with that of a property. F. P. Ramsey’s objections to this distinction are challenged. The sense in which objects possess an individuality not exhibited by entities of certain other types is discussed. The object/property distinction is distinguished from that between universals and particulars. The ontological status of events and processes, and that of abstract entities such as numbers, are examined. Gottlob Frege’s treatment of number and his object/concept distinction are criticized, and an alternative account of the ontological status of concepts is advanced.Less

The Concept of an Object in Formal Ontology

E. J. Lowe

Published in print: 2005-12-01

The formal ontological concept of an object is explicated and contrasted with that of a property. F. P. Ramsey’s objections to this distinction are challenged. The sense in which objects possess an individuality not exhibited by entities of certain other types is discussed. The object/property distinction is distinguished from that between universals and particulars. The ontological status of events and processes, and that of abstract entities such as numbers, are examined. Gottlob Frege’s treatment of number and his object/concept distinction are criticized, and an alternative account of the ontological status of concepts is advanced.

This chapter discusses formal theories of truth: the redundancy theory and its ilk, distinguished by the attempt to characterize truth in terms of its structural properties, in the context of the ...
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This chapter discusses formal theories of truth: the redundancy theory and its ilk, distinguished by the attempt to characterize truth in terms of its structural properties, in the context of the position adopted by Putnam in his John Dewey Lectures, here styled ‘Common-sense Realism’. This position is described, combining two principles called the Thesis of the Internality (according to which the elements of a representational system are internally related to their content) and the Thesis of World-Embeddedness (which holds that content is dependent on the world in a more than causal way), with a formal account of truth. It is argued that Common-sense Realism, along with all theories comprising a formal account of truth, should be committed to the flames, because they are cut off from exploiting the Fregean model of meaning, based on a recursion on truth.Less

Formal Theories of Truth and Putnam's ‘Common‐sense Realism’

Barry Taylor

Published in print: 2006-05-18

This chapter discusses formal theories of truth: the redundancy theory and its ilk, distinguished by the attempt to characterize truth in terms of its structural properties, in the context of the position adopted by Putnam in his John Dewey Lectures, here styled ‘Common-sense Realism’. This position is described, combining two principles called the Thesis of the Internality (according to which the elements of a representational system are internally related to their content) and the Thesis of World-Embeddedness (which holds that content is dependent on the world in a more than causal way), with a formal account of truth. It is argued that Common-sense Realism, along with all theories comprising a formal account of truth, should be committed to the flames, because they are cut off from exploiting the Fregean model of meaning, based on a recursion on truth.